WATCH: he Founders Behind ASHYA Debut A Fantastical Short Film Centering West African Folklore

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ASHYA’s latest short film provides a lesson on documenting your own story—this is a tradition that functions as a core value for the brand’s founders too.

Transcript

00:00 [Heartbeat]

00:12 [Screaming]

00:15 [Rumbling]

00:24 [Heartbeat]

00:38 [Rumbling]

00:40 [Silence]

00:59 [Music]

01:08 It's just like really beautiful like release that comes with that of putting

01:13 your putting the things that's spinning your head out into the world.

01:16 [Background noise]

01:24 It's really beautiful to see it all come together in one space and I think that

01:31 the audience and people who joined us on that day really got to understand

01:37 the world in a different way.

01:39 [Music]

01:45 It was really an opportunity to just tell a holistic story about Aja.

01:50 You know being able to incorporate both like our design, merchandising, spatial

01:56 taste and also write and creative direct performance piece you know like really

02:04 stretch our creative expression in that way.

02:07 [Background noise]

02:26 We're genuinely curious people. I think that is the inception of it that genuine

02:31 spark within ourselves.

02:32 [Music]

02:45 [Background noise]

02:53 I definitely want to express so much gratitude to Nana.

02:56 Yeah I felt like she handled the concept with so much care and allowed us the

03:04 space to explore in ways that we needed to in the beginning to really like

03:09 settle in it and I think a lot of her work was really in helping our performers

03:14 find their own interpretation.

03:17 [Music]

03:33 This is the moment where the light is going to be behind you.

03:36 [Music]

03:55 That's how we develop more empathy by being curious and open minded about the

04:00 world. We continue to come upon literature and text around oration, oral

04:10 storytelling, storytelling as a way as a means of preserving culture.

04:15 By Nancy, by and by the stories that Nancy was able to share the stories with

04:22 the world and with the community and with the diaspora.

04:26 [Music]

04:48 A God.

05:03 A God of sacred tale.

05:14 Who is a Nancy?

05:19 That led to those stories being a Nancy. A story that came from West Africa,

05:25 traveled all the way to the Caribbean, to all over America.

05:33 It's continued to survive after all these centuries and that ultimately sparked

05:39 something within us to say, you know, what does that look like through our lens?

05:44 It takes me a minute because the process of making it is so long that I'm just

05:48 like, I'm still in the cutting circles.

05:51 I can cut it like this, right?

05:53 Yeah.

05:54 Okay.

05:55 [Music]

06:01 I'll put like a lot here.

06:03 [Music]

06:06 Okay.

06:07 [Music]

06:09 It's always about finding people that resonate with whatever story we're trying

06:13 to tell.

06:14 We chose collaborators whose opinions and creative perspective we really

06:19 appreciate it and really admired.

06:21 [Music]

06:35 I think I remember.

06:42 I remember darkness.

06:46 There were so many moments of vulnerability.

06:49 It really just unlocked something really beautiful within us.

06:57 [Inaudible]

07:25 You are my creative vulnerability partner.

07:28 I'm so happy we can do these things together.

07:36 It was so nerve-wracking, but we pushed ourselves.

07:39 I think I was very fearful, but also really excited about the challenge and the

07:46 experience.

07:48 And oftentimes on the other side of fear, there's typically, you know, this

07:53 expansion.

08:06 I think the most important thing about storytelling is leaving something

08:09 behind.

08:11 [Music]

08:40 [Music]

08:58 I, a spirit of a rebel, a spirit of the unnatural order, a god of sacred

09:08 tales, I remember darkness and doubt.

09:16 They thought I'd forgotten, but I remember the tales of our mothers and

09:23 fathers, the tales of me.

09:28 [Music]

09:43 [Music]

10:03 [Music]

10:14 [Music]

10:19 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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